Welcome to our Together on Mission podcast, where we seek to be with and like Jesus, as we begin a conversation with Jesus in the morning, through scripture, prayer, and meditation, and then continue that conversation within throughout your day. Your host is Travis Twyman, the pastor at the Inland Vineyard Church in Corona, California. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Together on Mission podcast. Happy Wednesday morning.
Turn to Luke chapter 24, because we are in the chapter where Luke's story, biography about Jesus comes to its high point, its crescendo, and we're going to read a passage and then bounce off that passage into a time of having a conversation with Jesus, and that time is going to lead to having a conversation with Jesus throughout the rest of the day, because we're his students, we're his disciples, we're his apprentices, and we get to be with him, and we get to become like him, and when we talk about becoming like him, there's no better place to go than the bodily resurrection of Jesus. That is the heart of the Christian faith. And so the title of the podcast this morning is Everything or Nothing, and you can turn to Luke chapter 24 in a moment, we're going to begin reading in verse 36, but the title again, Everything or Nothing, because Jesus was either raised from the dead bodily or he was not, and if he was, as Luke testifies, then everything changes. Everything about us and our lives and our values, our priorities, our relationships, if he was raised bodily from the dead, everything changes, and if he was not, then nothing need change at all.
Years ago, I heard either a preacher or a professor tell this story that there was this enormous, exquisite, unbelievable painting, and it was huge, and it was given to a college in the area, and so the curators of that college looked literally at every wall space that the college had to offer. You know, in all the classrooms, the foyer, the amphitheater, every wall space that that college had to offer to hang this exquisite, beautiful portrait, and no wall space was found that really worked, and so the only option was to literally tear down the college, just demolish the college, tear it down, and rebuild it around the wall space that would house this portrait, this picture, because it's so beautiful, it's so exquisite, and so the only option is tearing down the existing structure and rebuilding a new one to house, to showcase, to focus on this portrait, and that seems to be Luke's message at the end of this incredible biography when it comes to the bodily resurrection of Jesus. And so I just want to begin reading in verse 36, you know, last chapter in Luke's gospel, while they, the disciples, were still talking about this, and the this refers to Cleopas and his wife encountering Jesus, so they said, on the road to Emmaus, telling the disciples, and the disciples were struggling to believe what Cleopas and his wife had said, and so they were talking about this, and all of a sudden, verse 36, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, peace, be with you. They were startled and frightened, and they thought it was a ghost, but Jesus said to them, why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds?
Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself, touch me, and see, a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see I have. And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet, and while they still did not believe it, because of joy and amazement, he said to them, do you have anything to eat? They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it, and he ate it in their presence.
What a passage. I mean, there's no analogy for this passage. It's new. And, you know, they thought it was a ghost, and maybe their translation for ghost would be a spirit, right, similar to the transfiguration with Moses and Elijah appearing as spirits, if you will, or in the Old Testament, when Saul conjures up, you know, Samuel, it was a spirit, right?
They were thinking it's a spiritual being, right, non-physical, and that's what many people have done with the interpretation of the resurrection of Jesus. It was a spiritual, non-physical resurrection. It was a vision. It was an experience in the hearts and the minds of the disciples, right?
Their hearts were strangely warm, but that is not a story that Luke is telling. Jesus says, does a spirit, a ghost, have flesh and bones, as you see I have? And he invites them to touch. Look at my hands.
Look at my feet. In other words, the marks, you know, from the cross were there. There's continuity with the body that died and the body that was raised. And this is so big.
Jesus says, do you have anything to eat? And they gave him a piece of fish, and it says that the resurrected Jesus ate this in their presence. They watched him eat something. I mean, this is new creation, but it's also creation, right?
It's a new physicality, but it is physical, and there's no analogy for this. So the resurrection of Jesus is something that the world has never seen. It's actually matter becoming what matter was intended to become, fully charged with the glory and the grandeur of God. And evidently, physicality doesn't diminish God's glory.
It enhances God's glory, right? And there is continuity with the Jesus that died, but there's discontinuity, new creation, new physicality. Jesus was resurrected into this world that he made, which points to the fact that this world will be resurrected, but that is another topic. Jesus, Luke says, has been raised from the dead.
He could be touched. He could eat fish. And he was proving to his disciples that he was physically, bodily, actually, literally raised from the dead. And what Luke is saying, and this is how I want us to begin to think about our lives this morning in light of this incredible passage, right?
If Jesus has been raised from the dead, then everything must change. If he has not been bodily raised from the dead, then nothing need change. Jesus is like the great portrait given at this college. There was no space large enough to showcase this portrait or this picture, so there's only one option to tear down our lives completely, and that's the cross.
And rebuild our lives and every aspect of our lives around this picture, this portrait, this reality, this event called the resurrection of Jesus. And this is the most radical doctrine of the Christian faith. And sometimes I think we've treated it as something to simply hang somewhere, or we talk about it occasionally, or make minor tweaks in this area or this relationship in our life. But again, if Jesus has been raised from the dead, as Luke testifies, everything changes.
Everything changes. And if he has not been raised from the dead, then nothing need change. But the early first century gospel kerygma was that the crucified and risen Jesus is now ruling and reigning as the Lord of the world. So let's take just a bit of time this morning.
Let's think about our pursuits, our relationships, our values, our priorities. Let's tear down, let's have the Holy Spirit tear down our lives and then rebuild every aspect of our lives around this central world-changing, life-changing event called the bodily resurrection of Jesus. The tomb is empty. And I think specifically, and this is what I'm going to do in just a moment, this morning, let's inquire as we ponder the resurrection of Jesus, what area, what priority, what relationship in our life must be torn down, that's the cross.
So it can be completely rebuilt around the fact that Jesus has been raised from the dead and so we have new life as well. And we will talk tomorrow. Thanks for listening to the Together on Mission podcast. We truly hope that you were blessed and encouraged by it today.
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